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I was thinking it would be nice to frame some pictures. And I would dearly love to have one of Minnie's paintings. And more dearly I would love to have something by Sandow Birk. Ideally the LA and SF women from Smog and Thunder. LA; chicana, pregnant, with belly hanging out, baseball cap, and skateboard; SF, boy toy dyke in black leather jacket (rollerblading? at protest march? with queer flag, something like that). I can't find images of them anywhere but to give you an idea of the painting style here is The Romance of Commerce and Portrait of General Juan Gomez. I saw the portrait of the general (from the fictional war between San Francisco and Los Angeles over water rights) a few years ago in an enormous show.

While I was hurting today my one thought was that I didn't want Moomin to see me helplessly suffering. My other one thought was "Oh, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, OW."

I began having all these heroic fantasies about how I would have some accident and be bleeding to death and would calmly explain to Moomin how to dial 911 without him becoming panicked by my situation. Because I would show no fear! No pain! I had an astonishingly strong feeling that I would, or should, go to any lengths in order to avoid my child seeing me suffer.

this morning I went to the old house and dealt with police and made a list of things missing. Police sort of shruggy and explaining that fingerprints unlikely. I called all the credit card companies and everything seems okay there too. Why did the "thieves" leave a perfectly good credit card of mine, but take the 25 buck gift certificate to the "wherehouse"? teenagers...? and they took the pink change purse, but left the credit cards and other gift cards there on the floor. Hmmm.

Home. Rook stayed there to move the last of the stuff. He ended up in a giant argument with the landlord who wants to go in there now and in fact is in there now, yet still charge us rent till march 8th.

Meanwhile I was back at the new house. Suddenly I coughed and my back went into a giant spasm that made me cry. Moomin: "Mommy, I will pat you and kiss your back and maybe gently rub it and it will make better. Maybe that will make better your back." Nice kid, bad grammar. Ibuprofen, codeine, albuterol, heat on back, video for Moomin.

I was unable to take a deep breath. In fact I still can't. But at some point about an hour ago I coughed violently and painfully and some stuff came up from somewhere around my navel and the pain all disappeared instantly like magic. Then I realized I still couldn't take a deep breath even without the pain. On my peak flow thing I usually can blow 550+ cubic whatevers. 450 is asthma that is bothersome. Well I was just blowing 350 on the thing and steaming myself in the bathroom boringly. Is this pneumonia? I don't think I have any sort of fever. So I don't think so... just oddly painful bronchitis... My chest does hurt and it has a sort of yucky slurping noise in there. Now back up to 400 which means I feel human. It can be really comforting to measure these things.

I am back to the steam room now with some very garlicky broth in a mug. No more unpacking... I have to take this seriously... and really rest. Nethack, and Hakluyt, you shall be my nurses.

But the real luck was the fabulous rest of the evening. Doxie's party had me slightly unnerved because I knew a lot of people from bl@ck le@ther w1ngs would be there and I have not seen them for almost 10 years and now from being Doxie's girltoy hot young thang femmy top lesbo (though at the time I ended up having a boyfriend and living with him too), I show up with husband in tow, smelling of the suburbs. Admittedly, cute, somewhat ambiguously gendered, coolest in the universe husband, but ... just a couple of awkward moments as I get enthusiastic hug and pat on my leather-clad ass from some girlie and then pop! at my elbow looms a large smiling man looking like my outfit accessory and wanting introductions. heh heh heh.

But that was not my main problem. the main problem was that goof-ass article i wrote about being branded that freaked out Fecker and Calla. Now. Yes I said some mean spirited things but the article was playful, funny, and made fun of myself way more than anyone else. I made fun of Calla's accent and how she took a zillion yearrs to prepare herself to appear topless for the camera but I also talked about how I liked her and how she was nice. I made fun of Fecker and his 2 friends for taking even longer to fuss with their sarongs so they could look appropriately tribal for the camera but I also talked about how I saw him as an interesting role model and the odd tensions between the cool stuff and the suburban reality of his life. Then I made fun of myself quite a lot. And made fun of all the smudging with sage fake indianness. And I think I said some separate things that were my doubts about the body mod scene and dis-privileging oneself and making a subculture but where some things were reversible or hidable so that you could go get a good job, but what was considered much cooler was to do something non-hideable in the style of teardrop prison tattoos so that you were guaranteed to remain in the underground economy or work in record stores forever.

But here is the deal. It went into a zine that what, had maybe 100 or 200 copies at most and I figured no one involved would ever see it. (And I don't know if they did see it.) And my dear friend who is a genius writer but sometimes irritating framed the article in a different tone than I meant it so that from the headline and the things in sidebars it seemed like a direct attack on Fecker. More virulently than I had intended at all. And then right afterwards there was this giant horrible incident in S@nta Barbara where some people in our community got arrested and Dregon went to jail and it was pretty terrible. So I think Fecker and Calla were freaking that if Minnie and I hated them we could mess up their lives very severely just by calling the cops on them.

well that was a complicated explanation. But When I say that Fecker and Calla were pissed at me and I didn't feel welcome in the community anymore, that's why! And I think that anyone associated strongly with them heard something about it, from their point of view, and probably without reading the article, so that gossip was likely "Badger wrote a horrible hateful thing and published it and she is totally insincere." Ugh. As if then I would go off and write an exposé of the summer gatherings in the woods. I do really respect so many of the people and had very nice relations with them. I called Feckerr and Calla some years ago and made long detailed apologies which were accepted but they didn't want me coming to their house or anything and I can understand that...

And indeed I did feel some awkwardness last night.

BUT on the whole, my teflon soul was able to shed that awkwardness very quickly.

And I had a great time! And everyone was lovely and sleazy and wearing antique rabbit fur coats and beaded dresses and leather and hats with veils and the old-school butches in their chaps were rather darling showing off their new hormone muscles as many of them seem to be in some stage of FTM transition or intersexualness. And Doxie was lovely. And Rook was my cute boy toy. And I felt that I missed everyone and was welcome back. And my outfit was admired and I was not the youngest one and there was much flirting and grabbing and sleazing. The birthday cake had a giant very artistic picture in icing of Doxie with cane marks on her bare ass. I had fun talking with some of the 70s s3x radicals who work on a history project and archive. Dr. Bother, fellow sullier of lesbian purity, mom of toddler and SF nerd, showed up and so Rook had someone to talk with and did not shadow me uncomfortably the whole party. She and I then got a box of gloves and shyly plotted our assault on the helpless tied up and beaten Doxie but then it was time for cake and time to untie her so, alas, we did.

I especially admired the amazing scientific and technical skillz of Saro. Her glasses slip down and she looks like a mad scientist as she taps away with her evil homemade tools and oddly she also looks like a small shy brown shorebird. anyway she is cool on all levels and never boring. I believe she plays a mean game of scrabble, as does Doxie.

I do get mildly uncomfortable or uptight at these things when I realize that while people are good hearted and competent, they are less competent or responsible than you would expect sometimes because half of them are stoned out of their minds or something. I am okay with being stoned out of one's mind but someone has to be a sort of designated driver and be aware that for example, the front door out onto mission street is locked, which almost every time I looked, it was not. dorks. And if I were bottomming, (rare anyway, top on the streets, bottom between the sheets as they say) I would not trust someone stoned or on X to top me and know what they are doing and be aware of what's going on with me, much less to do anything really extreme. Anyway! A minor quibble compared to all the excellent wonderfulness of all those people and the party and Doxie herself.

And how did I get so lucky as to have a fabulous husband, live here where I wanted to live, have a nice kid, and he does not mind when I am all up in the coochie of my 60 year old ex girlfriend or making out with random half naked women in tallulah bankhead hats and fur coats? not only does not mind but beams upon it benevolently? what a fairy tale.

First of all with great hoo-ha we got ready to go out and realized that all our shoes and fancy high boots are still at the old house.

I drank a bunch of Robitussin and coffee and took extra asthma med to deal with my cough.

And at the old house I had cleverly turned off the electricity a few days early... Rook had a flashlight in his car, clever! And I realized that all these things were missing! Boots - missing! Tubs - overturned! Wait, the old computer is scattered across the hallway in several pieces! Where is my huge framed painting of the chinese emperor on the pinto pony, and the crappy 25 cent huge framed poster of picasso's don quixote, and in fact all our other huge framed pictures that I left in a stack in the living room?

Now keep in mind our crappy landlord calledl me a few days ago and wanted to bring his uncle's painting crew in to move our few remaining things into the garage so they could paint. But I said no because I would rather do it myself, because of the COMPUTER AND MY LARGE FRAMED PAINTINGS that I am especially fond of, but I can't do it for the next couple of days. And he was pissed.

Did my landlord go in there and vandalize the computer and do god knows what with the giant paintings as vengeance? What about the knee high leather boots, and the wooden cd racks with the change bowl and gift cards in it?

A sucky thing. There were credit cards in there I think. A credit card was on the floor next to the computer, and a couple of gift cards from xmas. (Why would our Thieves take the things they took? Why? And leave the things they left?) And I think in the wooden cd racks (empty of cds) there was a small box with my ENTIRE last four years' collection of other people's business cards in there. That I had meticulously collected from EVERYWHERE over the last two months and put in this box so that I could make a list of everyone's contact info. Including all my contact info for people from the translation conference. goddamn it!!!!!!!

I think this morning I will have to call the police and file a report. maybe they can fingerprint the computer as I didn't touch it.

The giant framed poster of Xena from the library was hidden behind a cruddy looking whiteboard. So it is still there.

Why? why? Why? If it were just the change bowl, the cd racks and the boots I would think it was teenagers. But why would teenagers take heavy glass fronted paintings almost as tall as me? and obviously not valuable?

Based on my blinding insight of yesterday about wiping one's hands on one's socks, I have come up with a new invention. I woke up from my nap this afternoon laughing so hard I choked.

Yes, it's the SOCKERCHIEF. For all those times when you are caught without a handkerchief. The Sockerchief! Made of special soft to the nose fabric, yet still sock-like! There you are camping and your nose starts running. Wait! Don't wipe your nose on your sleeve! Just stop and take off your hiking boots and VOILA. Whisk off your Sockerchief and blow!

Idea no. 1 was "Screw it with whole publishing thing." Either branch out T0llbooth Press or start new press with new name and publish through Xlibris squid's tr0ll story and Jo's book about moving and also Tr@ce and the Clocks. Squid to illustrate more. I will ask my friend N0ra who translates to translate them into Spanish and we could publish them facing-pages bilingual. And my little "what little birds do" book which is tiny but amusing with my illustrations. Ep possibly to make nice web site, help figure out intricacies of Xlibris, how to make actual small biz or else a non profit, and kick all our asses.

The twin goals being AUTHORS and LEGITIMACY and NOT GOING BEGGING and also making cool books that will be affordable and available that are bilingual span/eng. VECINAS, MAMACITAS, COMPAñERAS, HIVEMIND, COMADRES GRINGAñOLICAS UNIDAS.

Goddamn it! Yeah! Build it and they will come. My office will be clear of boxes soon and with a white board on the wall and we will have a MEETING.

This, I think from being charged up with feminist glory from my meeting on wittig with Professor Steed.